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Monday, October 6, 2014

It will take many steps to re-instill progressive values into American politics, but the start is a democratic sweep in November

By Marc Jampole

It’s becoming increasingly hard for a progressive to like the
current run of Democratic candidates. So many of the candidates running for
Congress, Senate and statewide offices are centrist or right-wing whose
politics are not even barely acceptable to the traditional progressive wing of
the Democratic party.

For one reason—making the Democratic party beholden to
progressives is the first step to re-instilling progressive values into our
political system.

The right wing didn’t build the conservative fortress that
is the contemporary American political scene in one day or one decade. They
started whittling away at basic Democratic ideas from the time of Reagan and
before—taking a few steps at a time: first one tax cut for the wealthy, then
another, and then another. First crushing the air traffic controllers, then
weakening rules that help unions organize, then going after public school
teachers and the pensions of all public workers. Flooding the media with
misleading studies falsely claiming that lowering taxes on the wealthy
increases employment; falsely claiming that extending unemployment makes people
want to stay home; falsely claiming that businesses don’t need regulation to do
the right thing regarding safety and the environment; falsely claiming that
moving to renewable fuels will shrink the economy; falsely claiming that
returning the minimum wage to its buying power in the 1970’s would cost
jobs. Bit by bit, ever so slowly, the
right wing pushed the country to the right.

And it’s only this gradualist approach that’s going to work
if we are to return the country—on a 35-year binge of bad ideas—back to on the
progressive path of the 1930’s-1970’s.

And it starts with this November’s vote: Politicians care
about two things and two things only—money and votes. The more progressive the
position, the less money the 1% will put up, but we can still beat them by
getting out the vote.

If we can achieve the voter turnout of the 2008 and 2012
presidential elections, the Democrats will keep control of the Senate and eat
into the Republican House majority (gerrymandering after the 2010 elections may
make the House a lost cause until 2016). Everyone will know that it was turn
out of traditionally Democratic groups such as the poor, young and minorities
that swung the 2014 election to the Democrats.

In short, the Dems will be beholden to progressives.

Then comes the second step—insisting that every Democrat in
office or running for office in 2015 and 2016 espouse basic progressive
principles. It is imperative that
progressives start a letter-writing program to all their elected Democratic
officials giving them an ultimatum: support these causes or else we will vote
for someone who will.

It would be wonderful it the most progressive government
officials such as Elizabeth Warren and Bill De Blasio should steal a page from
New Gingrich circa 1994 and put together a new Contract with America and make a
public display of asking every Democratic candidate to sign it.

If I were to write The Progressive Contract for American, it
would contain the following basic legislative and regulatory demands:

Pass laws that overrule the Citizens United decision that
unleashed the ability of large corporations and wealthy individuals to turn
elections through massive infusions of money.

Raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour

Develop regulations that make it easier for unions to
organize workers and harder for companies to stop them.

Raise taxes on incomes of more than $250,000 and place an
annual wealth tax on all personal assets over $10 million, including fine art
and real estate.

Add a small transactional tax to all stock trades.

Raise tariffs on select foreign goods so that they get no
price advantage because their countries of origin have lower worker wages or
lower safety and environmental standards.

Pass legislation that ends harmful corporate practices,
including pretending the company is headquartered in another country,
reclassifying U.S. income as foreign income and outsourcing basic operational
jobs to lower wage and benefit costs.

Begin a massive investment in repairing our roads, bridges
and public school buildings.

Begin a massive investment in solar and wind energy,
advanced technologies to increase energy efficiency, technologies to mitigate
the most severe effects of global warming, space exploration and medical
research.

Go to a single payer system for purchase of prescription
drugs for Medicare and Medicaid.

Create an immigration policy that includes a road to
citizenship and lifts quotas across the board and not just for high-salaried
workers.

Invest in vocational training programs at public high
schools and community colleges so that those who are not suited for jobs that
require college degrees can get low-cost training.

End all federal and state aid to charter schools that do not
perform better than their neighborhood equivalent in two years or who lose 30%
of their teaching staff within any 12-month period; put a cap on what charter
school executives can make and a floor equal to the pay of public school
teachers in the region on what charters school teachers make.

Pass federal and state laws permitting gay marriage and
protecting the right of a woman to have an abortion.

Progressives may not agree with everything I am proposing, but there is plenty of time to hash over those details. The main thing now is to vote on November 4 and vote for the only party that listens to the 99%—even though at the current moment it is listening with one ear closed and the other also hearing hedge-fund billionaires.

If it weren’t for the entertainment value, I’d be pleased that Texas Governor Rick Perry is foundering in the Republican presidential race. After all, Governor Perry, who is in an unprecedented fourth term as chief executive of the nation's second-largest state, still might get the Republican nomination for president. If that happens there’s no telling what the voters might be fooled into doing. Just look at how far George W. Bush got.